100 moments of tenderness, 10000 words left unsaid
by Ophium
Summary: 100 ficlets going from season 1 to season 6, one for almost every episode aired. All genre. One swear word. Complete.
1. Season 1

These and the 80 more or so that will follow, were written as a birthday gift for a very good friend, Jackfan2. Knowing her love -obsession- for all things hurt and comfort, I went looking for those little moments in each of the episodes that have aired so far. Beware, season 6 is also a part of this series. Enjoy!

**PILOT**

The body in his arms trembles like a high-intensity power line, sizzling from within with nervous energy and grief that can barely be contained by skin. They both know it was too late, but Dean's more than aware that the rush to go back into that house and rescue Jess from the flames won't go away until long after the embers have gone cold.

The acrid smell of melting plastic and flesh is all they can smell and Dean pretends not to notice when the nervous energy turns into tears. And he holds on tighter.

* * *

**WENDIGO**

It takes five beers and half a pie to bring Dean down from the high of killing a Wendigo and finally allow Sam to tend to his broken ribs.

Sam's mind should be on the search for their father and on the hunt for the thing that killed Jess; instead, he's wondering what caused the seven inches long scar on Dean's back, right above his right kidney. Sam pulls the wraps tighter around his brother's chest and can't help but wonder who was there to keep Dean's body whole while he was away.

* * *

**DEAD IN THE WATER**

"Achoo-umph!" *sniff* "Zis is stowpid," Dean manages to say before another sneezing fit attacks.

"No," Sam says, looking at the plate in his hands. "It's tomato rice soup."

"But I'm nof – AchooUMPH!- sick," Dean counters with what was, mostly, not-a-pout.

"I know you ain't… this is not medicine," Sam said. "Now, eat your soup."

* * *

**PHANTOM TRAVELER**

"You okay?"

"Yeah… I'm fine. It was just a dream."

"So… those are not-tears in your face?"

"You're seeing things. Get a shrink."

"And that was you not-screaming Jess's name in your sleep?"

"Hearing too… this might be something serious."

"Yeah, yeah… first signs of madness in the already deranged."

"Exac—hey! What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm not-hugging you. Now, shuddup and go back to sleep, Sasquatch."

* * *

**BLOODY MARY**

"I let mom die."

"What?"

"That night, of the fire in our house… I saw a strange man walk right by my bedroom door, into your room. And I..."

"So that was why your eyes bled," Sam stated, remembering that he hadn't been the only one Bloody Mary's attack. "You were four, Dean. What could you have possibly done?"

"I could've warned mom… I could've warned dad. Instead, I just hid under my bed covers."

"And had you done any different, things might've just ended up the same… or worse. Some things are just not in our power to change… no matter how guilty we feel about them."

"Funny…"

"What?"

"The way you keep telling others the truths you're too stubborn to accept for yourself."

"I hate you."

"Yeah… I know you do. Bitch."

"Jerk."

* * *

**SKIN**

Dean is silent as he hands the bag of frozen carrots to Sam.

"Carrots? Really?"

"They're supposed to be good for your eyes," Dean offers with a smirk that has nothing to do with that imposter's version of Dean's smile.

Sam doesn't actually eat the carrots, but the swelling of the black eye that the Shapeshifter gave him doesn't stand a chance under the care and attention of the real Dean.

* * *

**HOOKMAN**

It's too soon, Dean knows that. But he can't help but feel a little bit of hope for his brother when he catches Sam, smiling shyly in response to the look that the reverend's daughter throws his way.

It won't go much further than a little flirting, but in the meantime, Dean's more than welcome to distract the father while Sam heals his wounds with the daughter.

* * *

**BUGGS**

"Wake up, Dean. We're here."

Dean squints into the fading light to catch the name above the office they're parked in front of. "'_Mommy's Quarter_'? What the hell, Sam?"

"Our room is in the back. I called ahead to book it."

"Bo—Sam… there's actually vases with actual flowers hanging from the windows. How can this be the cheapest motel that you could find? I don't think this even qualifies as a motel anymore. It's like... an Inn or something."

"Two words."

"Those better be: I suck."

"Steam. Showers."

Dean's annoyance dissolved into a grin. "Sometimes, Sammy… you're a true genius."

* * *

**HOME**

"Quit staring at me like that."

Sam's lost gaze focused on the brother he'd been staring at for the past hour. The fact that he'd been caught at it didn't even registered. "I had no idea."

"What? That it was creepy? It is," Dean voiced in annoyance.

"About the looks."

"What looks? T'hell you talking about?

"The only image I had of mom was from photos. She was always smiling in the photos, so, I didn't see the resemblance. But now… I can see from where you get that look in your eyes. She had it too."

"What look?"

"Sadness."

* * *

**ASYLUM**

When Dean had said that he just wanted to sleep he hadn't been kidding.

Sam watched silently as his brother flopped boneless onto the bed closest to the door without as much as pulling the covers aside or taking off his shoes. He was out even before his head had hit the flat pillow.

Sam sunk his teeth into his lower lip, biting down the words that he was dying to say, the apology stuck in his throat since he'd been free from Dr. Ellicott's influence. Instead, he moved quietly across the room, unlacing Dean's boots and pulling them off his feet, one at a time. The heavy leather jacket was next, Dean's body rolling pliable under Sam's gentle touch.

The fact that there was barely a stir on Dean's part as Sam worked to get him as comfortable as possible, only served to renew Sam's sense of guilt over what had happened, over what he'd done and said to his brother.

He pondered the benefit of taking Dean's shirt off, glued to his chest with tiny spots of blood as it was. The puncture wounds would need cleaning, eventually. But that was sure to wake Dean up, and sleep was the one thing that Sam didn't wanted to rob his brother of that night. He'd already taken enough.

Hearing Dean's content sigh as the extra weight of boots and coat was lifted from his body, Sam knew his choice was the right one. He pulled the cover from his bed and set in over Dean's curled body.

"I'm sorry," Sam found himself whispering, even if there was no one there but his conscience to hear it.

* * *

**SCARECROW**

"Stop squirming or I'll end up poking this needle in your eye!"

"It's a shallow cut anyway… stitches are overkill."

"It was still bleeding hours after it happened. It needs stitches."

"You're a mother hen, that's what it is."

"And you're a headless chick who walks into traps. Deal with it."

"Hey! How the hell was I supposed to guess that the damn professor was in on it?"

"Small town, Dean. He's probably second degree cousin with just about everyone in that place. Now, stop moving your head around."

"I had it all under control."

"I saved your ass."

"All part of the plan, Sam, all part of t—hey! did you just called me a chick?"

* * *

**FAITH**

Some things you just don't plan for. Some things don't even enter your mind when you're in your twenties.

At fifteen, Sam already could easily deal with bullet wounds, stab wounds, hanging guts, gashes so deep you could see bone and infected bites that stank so bad they made your eyes water.

Sam's eyes watered for entirely different reasons now, as he watched Dean struggle to pull his belt tighter, exhausted already beyond measure after pulling up his jeans and struggling with their metal button. The two shirts and Sam's hoodie, that had just that morning stopped fitting him and could only be worn by Dean, had been the easy part, put on while Dean was still in bed.

It'd been a downhill struggle after that.

"I got this, don't worry," Sam jumped in before Dean could even figure out how the hell was he going to bend over to pick up his shoes and put them on, never mind tying the laces. Moving his head too fast these days sent him straight to the floor, all lights out.

Sam's hands were steady as he picked up one boot and slipped it onto Dean's socked foot. His eyes shimmered with unshed tears as Sam remembered the countless times Dean had done the same thing for him. Now, in many ways, it tasted of goodbye to return the favor.

* * *

**ROUTE 666**

"Wake up."

"Humm... wha... is it my turn to drive already?"

"Nope... we're just stopping for food."

Dean looked around, the bright neon light of an orange owl flashing against the night sky. "Food?"

"Yup. Figured you'd like to grab a bite and we were driving by this place anyway..."

The smile that spread over Dean's face was akin to a cat's seeing the bird's cage wide open. "Seriously? A bite? At Hooters?"

The smile that Sam offered in return could rival with his brother's. "Yeah... I hear they have really hot wings."

* * *

**NIGHTMARE**

When Dean had told him that he had something that Max Miller had never had, Sam had figured he'd meant just the big brother part. This... this hadn't really crossed his mind.

"Seriously, Dean? Somehow, I don't think that the color of the guy's skin had anything to do with him setting off to kill his whole family. Or with the mess that was inside his head."

"Not taking any chances here, Sammy," Dean announced as he took off his shirt and scanned the beach for scarcely clad women. "That guy was too pasty to be happy... we're dealing with this matter one tan at a time. Now, pucker up and enjoy the sand and sea."

* * *

**BENDERS**

"You should've said something, you idiot," Sam muttered as he took a good look at the mess that was hidden by Dean's shirt. "Hundreds of cars in those yahoos' back yard, and you just lets us walk out of there instead of picking out a car."

Sam waited for a reply, for a justification, but it wasn't like Dean would be holding up his side of the conversation anytime soon. He made sounds, mostly moans and sighs, that couldn't in any form or language be confused with words. Except when he was whispering Sam's name. "Sammy..."

"Don't '_Sammy'_ me. We walked for four miles, Dean... frigging _walked_ with your shoulder cooked to crispy by those asses... and you don't say a single word to me about it! Talking about being jumped by humans, and what pie's flavor you're craving for, about the _frigging weather_! Soon as you wake up, I'm punching you in the face... remember that."

They had made it into the town and the car impound before Dean had finally toppled over in the Impala's passenger seat. So boneless and heavily that Sam had initially thought that he was horsing around. All it took was one look at Dean's fevered flushed face for Sam to realize that there were no horses involved in Dean's lack of response.

The incoherent sounds Dean kept making turned into half whispered words as Sam worked to peel all the little pieces of fabric imbed in the burned flesh. Sam's name turned into a plead, humph turned into _'find you'_ and into _'come back'_.

Sam stopped his ministrations; unable to tear his eyes away from Dean's flushed face.

Fevered eyes, red and too blotchy to actually be seeing anything but a blur, opened to look directly at him. "Come back, Sammy... I miss you."

It was more than Dean had ever said since the day Sam had left for Stanford. It was more than he would ever say again.

Sam blamed it on the fever. He blamed it on the Benders. It was all much easier than blaming it on himself.

* * *

**SHADOW**

Fifteen stitches. And that was not counting the butterflied gashes all over.

"You think we-eer evva gonna see dad again, Deany?"

And two Vicodins. Dean had to keep in mind the Vicodin, so he wouldn't punch Sam out for calling him '_Deany_'.

"I'm sure we will. The guy's the best," he answered, knowing there was no way Sam would even remember any of this in the morning. "Now sit still or I'll end up stitching 'loser' to your cheek."

"I'mmnnot a loser," Sam offered, after seriously considering the matter for a good five minutes. "You are... loser."

"Very mature, Sam."

"You end up... losing evva—everyone. Mom, dad, Cassie," Sam went on, failing to see the moment when the smile disappeared from Dean's face, being replaced by a frown. "Gonna... lose me too... 'cause... the loser cannever keep wha—what he wans."

That was the last time Dean ever gave any sort of opium-based drugs.

* * *

**SOMETHING WICKED**

"You know," Sam started like they hadn't been silent for the past hour, watching the scenery rush by the Impala. "I'm sorry too."

Dean didn't give him more than a confused look before returning his attention to the road.

"I got to be a normal kid until I was almost ten, and that illusion was only broken because I was too curious for my own good."

Dean smiles faintly at that, probably remembering all the times Sam _was_ too curious for his own good. His grip on the steering wheel relaxes just a few notches.

"You never got that choice... not since you were four and it was taken from you," Sam went on. "And for that, I am truly sorry for you."

Dean opens the car's window to allow the wind free reign inside the Impala. That way, when Sam notices the tears, he'll have an excuse for them.

* * *

**DEAD MAN'S BLOOD**

Sam didn't see how this could possibly be a good idea. How could this even be called a plan? He and his dad where hidden in the bushes near the road, still too far for comfort, patiently waiting for the nest of vampires that was onto their scent, to catch a whiff of Dean. Who was alone. In the middle of the road. Playing the car-problem, dumb-blond-in-trouble bait card.

The trick was probably older than some of those vampires.

Watching the way that she-vampire prowled around his brother, grabbing Dean and forcefully kissing him while they stood and watched, gave Sam, all of a sudden, a complete and clear insight over all those hunts gone wrong over the years. The ones that had happened before he was 'allowed' to join dad and Dean and that had ended with John carrying a bloody Dean into their motel' rooms.

It was hard to keep the bile inside as Sam figured for just how long Dean had been paying bait for his father's obsessions. And for how long dad allowed the deceit to go on.

* * *

**SALVATION**

Dad's yelling was doing nothing for the raging headache that took Sam's brain by assault every time he had one of his 'visions'. For a flash of images that lasted less than thirty seconds, Sam was almost always granted with a nagging migraine-like pain that lasted for hours.

Even if John knew about that particular fact, Sam doubted he would've shut up anyway.

Dad was being an ass about them –Dean- not telling him about Sam's visions. Sam wanted to shout back at him, to tell his father that they couldn't get a hold of him even to know if he was still alive, never mind to relay recent events. Sam wanted to shout back that every time they had needed their father, John was nothing more than a recorded voice in a cellphone's mailbox.

And then Dean, the one who never talked back, the one who always managed to find the silver lining of reason and sense within their father's most absurd actions and orders... Dean snorted at their father's angry words and, not stopping to allow any sort of reaction on John's part, proceeded to tell him everything that Sam wanted to yell back but was in too much pain to voice. Everything that Sam had wanted Dean to say for himself for a very long time.

He was yelling too, but to Sam's head, Dean speaking up for himself felt better than a thousand aspirins.

* * *

**DEVIL'S TRAP**

The pool of blood that grows under Dean's body is already too large for Sam to believe this will ever be all right.

"It's alright, Dean," Sam whispers all the same as he picks Dean up. "It's all going to be okay... I gotcha."

He's still whispering it as the truck collides with the Impala and sends them all into oblivion.


	2. Season 2

**IN MY TIME OF DYING**

Dean collapsed almost at the same time as the doctor declared that John Winchester was gone from this world.

Sam was too stunned to do anything; he just stood and watched as a father that he had never really understood, suddenly disappeared from his life; and as a brother, whom he had just recently begun to understand, fell at his feet.

The only thing that registered inside Sam's head was the same words, over and over again. Words that he would never share with anyone, words that he hoped Dean couldn't hear as he kneeled down to hold his brother.

'_Thank God it wasn't Dean.'_

_

* * *

_

**EVERYBODY LOVES A CLOWN**

Sometimes, a mother's instinct could be a downright pain in the ass.

There they were, two men –two boys- whom she should hate with every fiber in her body for no other reason other than the fact that they were the sons of the man who had stolen Billy from her.

Not to mention the fact that the oldest, Dean, was just Joanna Beth's type: good looking and the right mix of bad boy and lost boy.

Ellen could smell trouble from a mile away, just from looking at the dopey eyes her daughter was throwing at that boy.

But, instead of kicking them out the door like she should have, that damn lost-boy look that they both carried like a banner, had gotten to her too and, even though she knew for a fact that this couldn't possibly end well, she still opened out her mother's heart and her home to them.

* * *

**BLOODLUST**

"Lemme see that," Dean demanded as soon as they were inside the motel room.

Sam obediently extended his arm. There was no point in arguing with Dean when he was looking for atonement. Unnecessary as it was.

"Did you clean it properly?" Dean asked, staring at the dirty gauze on Sam's arm. "Or did you just slapped a bandage on it and hoped for the best?"

Sam actually blushed. Or maybe it was an early onset of infection. Either way, the color of his cheeks proved Dean's point.

In the rush to get Lenore and her group out of town and race back to Dean and Gordon before the two of them killed each other off, the proper cleaning and tending of stab wounds had sort of slipped Sam's mind. He had more important stuff to worry about at the time.

Dean knew exactly what Sam's silence meant. "Yeah, that's what I thought," he said, ripping the dirt bandage off.

* * *

**CHILDREN SHOULDN'T PLAY WITH DEAD THINGS**

The throbbing in Sam's broken wrist was nothing compared to the deep pain inside his chest.

Hearing Dean's teary confession and realizing that there was absolutely nothing that he could say that would ease his brother's angst hurt deeper than broken bones.

Dean was right.

What do you say to someone who is certain that his father has given his life for him? What words could possibly ease the unfounded guilt of being responsible for the death of a parent?

Sam realized he knew exactly what those words were. They were the same words that he had always hoped his father would have told him, despite the fact that Sam had been six months old when his mother died above his cradle.

"It's okay, Dean," Sam whispered to the wind, joining Dean in his pretense that they were all alone, up there in that cliff. "I forgive you."

Sometimes it's not about the meaning. It's just about the words.

* * *

**SIMON SAID**

"I don't think it needs stitches," Dean declared, eyes crossing over his nose as he carefully and closely analyzed the nasty bump on Sam's scalp.

"I wish you'd be honest with me," Sam said to the wall in front of him. The words, however, were clearly meant for Dean.

Dean looked puzzled, his eyebrows rising in search of any sense to Sam's words. "I am being honest. It _honestly_ doesn't need stitches. Why? Do you want some?"

"Don't be an ass," Sam let out, annoyed, apparently at the fact that Dean couldn't actually read his mind. "About my _powers_, Dean. About what the YED did to me and the other kids like me."

"I am honest with you," Dean defended himself. "We just don't know enough about it to mak—"

"Bull!"

"What?... seeing the future is part of what you can do as well? Is that it?"

"Well... no. But—"

"Not butts, no bull and no guessing, Sammy," Dean countered, his voice final. "Until we learn more about this, we make no assumptions. And that's as honest as it gets. Okay?"

"Okay."

* * *

**NO EXIT**

Dean moans in his sleep and Jo raises her head from the file she's currently reading.

She watches as Dean's brows contort like twin snakes above his closed eyes. His long body, too long for the chair he's fallen asleep in, follows the brows' cue, contorting into an impossible pretzel shape that can only be painful.

Jo smiles sadly. She has honestly never seen anyone that size squeeze himself to fit a space so tiny, like all the space that Dean Winchester occupies when he's awake and moving just disappears into nothingness when he closes his eyes.

"No... please..." he whimpers, the words barely forming pass his lips. Jo stands up and moves closer, hand up and ready to shake Dean awake. She knows enough about bad dreams to recognized when someone is trapped inside one.

"Don't," Sam whispers from the bed where he is not asleep either. His gentle voice halts her gesture before she can touch Dean. "He needs the sleep. Just... give him a minute."

They both sit in the dark, standing guard over Dean, watching as his facial muscles dance across all of his sad expressions, body closing into himself, unconscious protection from the outside.

"Dad... I'm sorry," Dean whispers, before settling down and sinking back into sleep.

* * *

**THE USUAL SUSPECTS**

It's late at night when Dean finally starts talking.

"There was this guy there, in one of the cells," he begins, as if they hadn't been pretending to be asleep for the past half an hour. "Caught his wife cheating on him with his next-door neighbor. Killed him, killed her, emptied their eye sockets and made himself an eyeball omelet. Police caught him, sitting at the kitchen table, fork in hand."

"People are weird, you know that," Sam says, not sure where Dean is going with this.

"He kept yelling at the cops that he was hungry, that they hadn't let him finish his meal."

"Crazy guy. What does th—"

"The cops were more scared of me than they were of him," Dean cuts in, voice heavy with disappointment. "With everything that we see, everything that we do, everything that we lost... some cannibal, nut-bag still rates lower in the cops creep factor than we do... than I do."

Sam pauses, swallows hard. It's the inglorious part of what they do, the other side of the coin that no one ever gets to see. Because Batman too had his cave, where he could hide and wonder why people treat him like a criminal. And they have dark motel rooms that serve as a confessionary and wonder if they'd be seen as anything but criminals one day.

"Go to sleep, Dean."

* * *

**CROSSROAD BLUES**

'_Hellhound on my trail_' was playing on the jukebox, the only one of Robert Johnson's that the bar had.

"Would you do it?" Dean asked out of the _blues._

Sam looked at him over the rim of his cold beer. "Do what? A pact with the devil?"

"Yeah."

The sound of hard balls bouncing off each other on the pool table filled the silence as Sam thought it over. "I don't know," he eventually said, taking a sip out of his bottle. "I mean, 'never say never' and all of that."

Dean bit his lip, cooling the bite off with his own cold beer.

Sam could see that that was not the answer his brother was looking for, but it was the honest truth and Sam believed that Dean wouldn't feel any better being lied to. Not after what they'd learned about their father and the way he'd died.

"What about you?" Sam asked, repeating the question that his brother had avoided answering before, in the car.

Dean set the bottle on the table with extra care, as if he was afraid that he might smash it if he wasn't very careful in it's handing. Like it was actually a fragile thing. "Never," he answered with finality. "It's just too painful for the ones who get left behind."

* * *

**CROATOAN**

They hadn't let him touch Sam, told him it wasn't safe, that he might get infected as well. But Dean wasn't listening.

His power of reasoning and rational thought had gone out the window the moment he saw that tiny nurse perched on top of Sam's chest, rubbing her infected blood on his brother.

Five frigging seconds, that was how long Dean had lost track of Sam. It seemed like a ridiculously small amount of time for Dean's world to end.

At that point, getting infected as well was just a bonus. So much so that Dean stopped short of cutting himself open and smearing Sam's blood on his open wounds. They would probably shoot him if he did that.

Instead, Dean grabbed Sam's shoulders, gripping him tight to raise his shaking brother up.

"It's okay, Sammy," Dean lied. "Everything is gonna be okay.

The fact that, hours later, everything is, in fact, okay, despite all the assumptions, suppositions and facts... actually feels more ominous and deadly than if they'd both died in that place. Somehow, it feels like the beginning of the end.

* * *

**HUNTED**

The last image that Sam has of his brother is of Dean, draped over his bed, in a drunken stupor. A drunken binge that Dean needed and Sam faked.

Dean would never understand what it was like to go on everyday, to live your life, while people suspected –expected- you to turn evil. To not know, to not have some answers... it was killing Sam.

He needed to find out what the changes happening to him were headed; he needed a test subject for comparison. He needed to find others like him.

Sam needed to learn what it all meant and, if all else failed, he needed to be as far away from Dean as possible. Because if there was one thing that Sam vowed he would keep under his control, it was whether or not Dean was hurt in the process.

Finding Dean tied up to a chair in an abandoned house rigged to blow at the slightest provocation, was not the way Sam had envisioned keeping Dean safe.

Too late, Sam realized that the matter of Dean getting hurt by what the YED had done to Sam, all those years ago in his nursery room, was now a moot point.

Sam couldn't keep Dean safe from what was happening to him. Dean had stopped being safe the day Sam turned six months and one day old.

* * *

**PLAYTHINGS**

It wasn't like Sam to get drunk on the job like that. He knew better. Hell! He was the one complaining whenever Dean decided to go out for a drink when they were in the middle of a hunt, even if the drink could be used to gather information.

Watching Sam sleep, butt jutting in the air like he used to do when he was a little kid, was the biggest clue for Dean to understand Sam's drunken stupor was really about.

Sam was scared. He needed someone to assure him that everything was going to be okay; that no matter what, _he_ would be okay.

Dean had tried his best at positive reassurance, saying things like _'you're in control of your own fate'_ or _'you are the best person that I know. There is nothing capable of turning you evil'_, words that sounded empty and hollow without access to a crystal ball to make sure that they were real.

Truth was, neither of them knew what the future could bring and their father, the only one who seemed to have some idea on what was going on, was gone.

As far as Dean could figure, his father would've made a much better job of reassuring Sam. As it was, he'd left his two sons adrift.

In Sam's drunkenness, Dean had bended to the next best way to make his brother feel better: an empty promise that, if all else failed, Dean would keep Sam's soul safe. By killing him.

As if something like that wouldn't doomed them both.

* * *

**NIGHTSHIFTER**

If it weren't for the fact that Dean was on the outside, hunting a shapeshifter on his own, with no one but a _civilian_ lunatic as 'backup', Sam would have had some fun with the cashier's crush on his brother.

It wasn't the first time that Dean caused some ill-founded good impression on the opposite sex, only to leave Sam with the downfall of having to hear the 'smitten' woman's rants about how 'perfect' and 'awesome' his annoying brother was. Usually, Sam would dispel them with made up stories about Dean's love for beating up kittens, his stinky socks (which was actually the God's honest truth), the way he hated babies or, the most effective of all, how gay he was.

Dean, coming back to pick up Sam after, apparently, having joined the '_robber_'s' side, worked better to shut the cashier than any of those things, had Sam chosen to say them. The disappointed look on the woman's face as she, like so many others before her, got the wrong idea about his brother, however, was not something that Sam enjoyed seeing.

He wished he could tell her that his brother was in fact one of the good guys, the best of the guys. But they had a shapeshifter to catch.

* * *

**HOUSES OF THE HOLY**

"We see so many strange things every day, so many weird beings that everyone else thinks don't exist, swears up and down to be fictional. Maybe… maybe angels aren't that much of a far fetched idea as I'd thought," Dean offered, sounding more like he was trying to convince himself rather than Sam.

"You're just saying that to make me feel better," Sam called him out on it.

"Yeah…" Dean confessed sheepishly. "Is it working?"

"Not really… but I don't really need to see them to know that there are angels watching over us."

"What makes you say that?"

Sam offered his brother a knowing smile, one that he knew to particularly piss Dean off. "Because if they weren't, we'd be dead by now."

* * *

**BORN UNDER A BAD SIGN**

Bobby set the bucket of water and the plastic bottle with his own mixture of bleach and coke -guaranteed to get rid of any bloodstain on any surface- on the floor next to the wall.

At the time the stain was made, Bobby had been too busy trying to fight the black spots on his vision, from having collided with a rather solid surface, and too busy trying to figure out why the hell the exorcism hadn't worked on the demon ridding Sam. He didn't saw much of what happened between those two against that wall.

What Bobby knew was that, whatever that bastard had done, it had left one hell of a bloodstain for Bobby to clean off his wall and floor. Add to it the whitewashed look on Dean's face when they'd finally gotten that demon out of Sam… and Bobby had a pretty good idea that it hadn't been a nice, civilized chat.

Dean had tried to cover it up by punching his brother and over-worrying about the burn on Sam's arm, but Bobby could see right through that boy.

Dean was a lot like those blood stains on the wall: a few brushes of a soaked cloth made them disappear, but you their presence would never really fade away.

* * *

**TALL TALES **

"Here," Dean said, tossing a money, silver clip on Sam's lap. The carefully folded bills flapped against Sam's leg like a well-worn book. "I forgot to give it back in the middle of the whole trickster confusion."

Sam picked it up, finger tickling the green money. "There's way more in here than what I had, Dean."

"Yeah… well… I figured that, seeing as your laptop is always freezing when I use certain… specialized research sites," Dean said with a wiggled of his brows, "we might as well get a better one."

* * *

**HEART**

"I got us a movie,"

"You did?" Sam can't help but ask, surprised. "I thought we were going out for some beers.

Dean glanced at the dark bruises under Sam's eyes, the redness in his eyelids and the blotchy face from the tears Sam _didn't_ cry when he locked himself in the bathroom.

"We can still do the beer thing," Dean said, producing a DVD cover from pocket, "while watching this."

"'_The lake house'_?" Sam let out as he took a look at the movie. "Isn't that like… the ultra chick flick?"

"You kidding? It has time travel _and_ Sandra Bullock in it. There is nothing chick-ish about that," Dean offered with a smirk, popping the movie in their laptop.

The six-pack of beer was joined by a bag of microwave popcorns. Salty. And the movie isn't exactly a 'ultra-chick-flick', but it's sappy enough. Besides, Dean had already seen it before and he knows exactly how it ends.

And right now, that happy ending is all Sam needs to see.

* * *

**HOLLYWOOD BABYLON**

They couldn't help themselves when they drove by a theater where the movie was playing. '_Hell Hazers II: The Reckoning'_ was as terrible as far as terrible movies go, the acting was atrocious and the storyline didn't really exist. But Sam and Dean had a very good laugh.

Their names, their real names, filling up the screen as the credits rolled by in the end, caught them by surprised. They were listed as 'special consultants' and offered a special thank you from the crew and cast, which… was odd enough by itself.

"Should've used fake names," Sam said as they left the dark theater.

"You kidding me?" Dean piped in, smile splitting his face in two. "I'm totally getting that DVD when it comes out!"

* * *

**FOLSOM PRISON BLUES**

Sam watched the door to Dean's cell close on the other side of the corridor with a ominous bang that he was sure to be only on his mind.

The guy they'd put him with made Sam feel like a dwarf, a feeling he hadn't experienced since fifth grade. He'd forgotten how annoying it was to be forced to look up if you wanted to talk with someone eye-to-eye.

"That guy is screwed," the giant inside Sam's cell announced out of the blue, voice deep enough to rattle the walls.

"What?"

"The pretty boy on the cell up ahead," he clarified, like Sam hadn't understood of whom he was talking about. "He's screwed."

"He can take care of himself just fine, don't worry," Sam said, the menace clear in his voice even as he took a step back so that he wouldn't have to bend his neck back to look at the guy straight.

"You're screwed too," the giant went on, not paying much attention to Sam's subtleties. "And the way you look at each other… will screw you both."

"He's my brother," Sam felt the need to clarify. "It's not what you think."

"Don't care," the giant said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Lose the _'care look'_… or find a way to get out."

It took Sam a moment to realize that the man was actually trying to help him and Dean.

And he could only stare. The man said it like either of his choices was actually a viable choice.

How was Sam supposed to start looking at his brother like he didn't care? And what was worse… how was he supposed to convince Dean to stop doing it himself, or that it was time for them to leave that place, even though the ghost was still on the loose?

Sam needed to end that hunt sooner rather than later. "Thanks," he whispered to the giant man. Maybe he could convince Dean that the ghost had just... _given up_.

* * *

**WHAT IS AND WHAT SHOULD NEVER BE**

All of those push-ups in the morning and the weight lifting whenever he had a chance had definitely paid off. If not, Dean and that girl he had been barely holding up, would've found themselves on the dirty floor of the abandoned warehouse when Dean's knees finally gave out and he folded on himself.

Arms full with a tiny girl and a not so tiny brother, Sam staggered to the stairways, holding both as best he could, which meant there were more limbs dragging through the floor than it would have been desired.

Knowing that Dean would probably kick his ass if he found himself inside the car while the young woman had been left behind, Sam picked her up first. Truthfully, it didn't matter which one he took first; they both needed to get out of there as fast as possible.

Still, Sam had to stop himself from looking back, telling himself that Dean was perfectly safe, leaning against the stairs like a string-less puppet; telling himself that he was nuts for imagining the Djinn rising back from the dead to take his brother away from him again.

'_I'm sorry_'.

Those were the words Dean had whispered just before he opened his eyes. _I'm sorry_, like it was a bad thing to choose to live.

Sam had never walked as fast as did then to the car. And if he raced back to get Dean after securing the girl in the back seat, it was something that no one could know because there was no one there to see it.

* * *

**ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE**

**Dean**

Dean couldn't pick Sam up. For years, he'd had no trouble in carrying his brother around. When he was nothing but a baby and Dean's arms barely managed to reach all the way around Sam, Dean had still carried him out of their burning house; later on, when Sam was a little bit holder, Dean would still pick him up to give Sam those pony-back rides that he used to love and John never seemed to have the time to offer anymore.

Sam's bigger than Dean now. Heavier too, from the extra muscle and the weigh of the rain on his soaked clothes.

A dead weight.

A weight that died in the same place he had always lived. Dean's arms.

**Sam**

Sam watched from afar the tight embrace between Bobby and his brother. The two of them had always been closer.

Sam remembers Dean following Bobby around even when they were kids, trying to learn as much as he could from the rust buckets that have always filled Singer's Auto while Sam was content with building a pile of books and go through them all one by one.

This, however, is something else... something other than a close relationship.

For a moment there, before the hug, Sam could've sworn that Bobby was ready to smack Dean; for a moment there, Sam was sure he would have to leave his hiding place to go break those two apart. The moment didn't come, though.

Instead, it was the _desperation_ behind that hug that told Sam that something was very, very wrong.

Deep down, Sam knew exactly what.


	3. Season 3

**MAGNIFICENT SEVEN**

It felt a bit cheap, to give Dean a chance to… do whatever he was doing with those two redhead women, as an atonement for him giving up his soul for Sam's life.

It wasn't exactly as linear as that, but in that right moment, while Sam was alone in the Impala, it certainly felt like that. It felt like everything that Sam could possibly do to make Dean's… last year… as easier as he could, would always be too little, too pathetic when compared to what Dean had done for him.

Surrendering to the gesture that had become a compulsion ever since he'd found out about Dean's deal, Sam picked up the hidden file he kept on his duffle and opened it. Inside were the first pieces of information that they'd ever gathered on crossroads' deals, a case they'd both worked months before.

The one where people ended up cut into shreds by hellhounds.

The picture of the lifeless and mangled body of Silvia Pearlman, the surgeon lady who had made a deal at Lloyds' bar, was on top of the pile of papers. Her legs had been ripped open, cut into ribbons by an animal that none of the forensic specialists had been able to name.

Dean's smiling face filled the open windows of their room until he pulled the curtains closed, giving himself and the girls inside an illusion of privacy.

Sam put the file away, picking up a book instead. _When_ he got Dean out of that deal, long before his brother could look anything like Silvia, Sam vowed that nights like this one wouldn't cease to exist.

It's just one of the many promises that Sam makes that year.

* * *

**THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT**

Dean comes back a lot sooner than Sam would expect him to. Given the horny way he'd been acting since making the deal, Sam had figured that the 'conversation' with Lisa would take, at least the rest of the day.

When Dean walks into their room, just minutes after Ruby had left, silent and doing his best to avoid looking at Sam, Sam knows that there's something up.

The trip down Dean's sex-memory lane, turned hunt for changelings… had turned into something much more serious it seemed.

Dean looked like he'd… lost something.

His mind occupied with what he'd found about their mother's family and friends and with their mysterious protector who had turned out to be a demon, had kept Sam from making the connection before. But he could see it now. Ben, with his absent father and age just about right for Dean's last encounter with Lisa, might've been more than just Lisa's kid and one more child to rescue from the mother changeling.

Sam's heart sunk to the floor as he realized that Dean might've just discovered that he had a son… on the last months of his life.

Of all the unfair things fate had thrown their way….

"We could stay," Sam offered, hoping that was what Dean wanted. "Even if we can't stop the deal, you'll still have a few months with yu-" _'with your son_' Sam stops short of saying, "-with Ben. It's more than what you had before."

"Ben's not my son," Dean corrects Sam, his tone dry and… longing.

Sam's heart clenches inside his chest. He sees it now. Dean isn't mourning something he lost; he's mourning one more thing that he'll never have.

* * *

**BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK**

"I never knew you played baseball," Sam's surprised words broke the silence that had settled while they worked. In his hand was a small picture, frayed around the edges.

Dean took the picture from him, holding it against the light of the naked bulb on the ceiling. A small smile jerked his lips up. "I guess I did, in another life," he said, looking at his three or four year old self, in full uniform, holding a bat that was, at least, as big as him. "I have no idea why dad kept this."

"He kept my soccer trophy too," Sam reminded his brother. "... and our school reports," he added with a frown, holding up a pile of papers yellow with age.

"Dad was really proud of you," Dean said, seeing the puzzled look on Sam's face. "You know that, right?"

"I'm starting to see that," Sam answered with a sad smile. "Too bad I'm too late."

Sam looked around, at all the stuff that their father had compiled in that small storage. Besides the personal things that they had barely begun to uncover, there were items that neither Sam nor Dean could guess at a origin. Like the coffin in the corner.

"Maybe we can sell some of this stuff... it's not like we're gonna use land mines in the near future..."

"I can think of someone I'd use a land mine on," Dean muttered.

"Dean..."

"I can't believe I let that bitch get away with all of our money."

"You have to let that go. It was just... bad luck," Sam said with a smirk, unable to restrain himself.

"Haha... very funny, Sam," Dean let out, anything but amused. "Those prized tickets were just about the only good thing we could've gotten out of this whole mess... and that bitch took them away."

Sam put the school reports back on the shelve where he'd found them, stealthy keeping Dean's photo and slipping it inside his pocket.

"Oh... I wouldn't say the _only_ thing."

* * *

**SIN CITY**

"You okay?"

Dean kept looking at the pool of blood, spreading large enough to cover the broken devil's trap. Casey and Father Gil and the demons inside them. All dead.

"Hey, Dean? You hearing me, man?"

Suddenly, Sam's face was right there, inches from Dean's nose, hiding the blood and bodies from view, eyes bright with the rush of adrenaline and something else, something that Dean couldn't name.

"Is that the Colt?" Dean finally whispered, looking at the gun in Sam's hand rather than at Sam. "Bobby's here?"

"Yeah, he's upstairs," Sam said with a nod, offering out his other hand to get Dean to his feet. "You ready to go?"

Dean nodded, leaving behind the one demon that had defended his life and had been repaid with death.

What goes around comes around, Dean figured.

* * *

**BEDTIME STORIES**

"There's a support group on Wednesdays, you know?" The woman behind the nurses' station offered.

Sam's head snapped back from where he'd been watching Dean walk away, down the corridor, trying to imagine what it would feel like to see him walk away for the last time. "Sorry?"

The woman, white hair tied in a ponytail that crowned her head, grabbed a folded flyer from the stand and hand it over to Sam. "Grief counseling group. Meetings are each Wednesday, at ten, in the second floor's library."

Sam looked dumbstruck at the paper in his hands. "I don't... why would I go there?" he asked, more curious than offended by the nurse's offer.

"You have that look on your face," she said, voice tender with care. "We see it all the time, in the faces of terminal patients' relatives. If you don't mind my asking... how long does he have?"

Sam blinked away the tears that had somehow returned to his eyes. "He's not dying."

The nurse opened up the flyer and pointed to one of the bullet pointed items.

Denial.

"When you're ready to reach this one, come and find us," she simply said.

Sam stared at the single word on the page; a word that said to him the same things that Dean had just told him: Acceptance.

* * *

**RED SKY AT MORNING**

Dean keeps a list. He believes that Sam knows nothing about it, but Sam has seen it. One day, when Dean wasn't around, Sam has even managed to read it.

There's about thirty items on that list, things that Dean wrote down, things that he's never done or never had. Things he is trying to accomplish before his number is up.

A bucket list.

Not all of the items on that list are deep and profound things (Dean has already crossed out 'having kids' and 'climbing to the top of the Himalayas' anyway), things that one might think about when the end is near. Some of them are such mundane things that Sam resents the fact that his brother never had a chance of living a normal life. Because, who else would put 'mowing the lawn' and 'having a tool shed' as bucket list items?

Some of them are pure Dean, like 'doing twin redheads' (that one he'd already checked as done) or 'hit a bulls-eye with eyes close' (which isn't checked yet, but Sam doesn't want to be even near any of the tries).

There was one that surprised Sam, because he'd never thought of his brother as a fashion person or having any sort of proneness to care about fancy clothes. Dean had actually made fun of Sam when he'd dressed up for his prom night. So, Sam had to read it twice, but it actually said 'Wearing a tuxedo and going to a fancy party'.

Which is why, when Bela suggests that they go with her to the Museum's party and tells them in no uncertain terms that she'll be providing the clothes they'll be wearing so that they wouldn't look like '_a pair of ragtag scavengers'_ –her words, not his- Sam did his best to not smile and look offended at the offer.

Bela never saw the eager and pleased look on Dean's face. But Sam did.

* * *

**FRESH BLOOD**

"You better keep away from me, Dean."

Dean raised his head in surprise, barely looking away from where he was trying to get a closer look at the deep scratches in Sam's hands. The fact that he couldn't quite focus, no matter how hard he blinked his eyes, was beginning to annoy Dean. Sam's nonsense talk wasn't helping matters.

"And why the hell would I do that? Not my fault you decided that barbed wire gloves was the new fashion hit this year."

Sam raised his bloody hands, pointing out the obvious. "Because I have Gordon's _infected_ blood all over my hands and you have too many opened wounds on your bleeding neck."

Dean blinked one more time, trying to figure out what Sam was telling him. "You're right," he finally nodded. "We should wash all that blood off of you right... now."

Sam had to physically restrain himself from catching Dean when his eyes rolled back mid-sentence and he fell to the ground.

Gordon had been more interested in maiming than feeding when he went for Dean's neck, and between what the newly-vampired hunter had drunk and what Dean had already lost, Sam was sure that there couldn't be much left. He had, however, hoped that they'd been able to reach the car before Dean's body did the math.

Sam figured his options now were between 'sucky' and 'suckier'... no pun intended.

He could either leave Dean there, go wash up and sanitize himself and come back for him later, which would most likely result in a dead Dean; or he could hope for the best and just grab Dean now and risk the both of them turning into vampires.

Despite what Sam _knew_ Dean would want, he picked his brother by the arms and slung him over his shoulder. And hoped none of them would come to regret this choice.

* * *

**A VERY SUPERNATURAL CHRISTMAS**

The idea came as an afterthought. Gift exchange was never what you might call a priority amongst Winchester men so, the thought of actually getting Sam something for that particular Christmas hadn't exactly been planned. In fact, it only occurred Dean to do so when he was at the cashier, waiting to pay for the tank of gas he'd just fed the Impala.

The gas stop shop, tiny as it was, was filled with Christmas paraphernalia, from chocolate reindeers, to stuffed Santas, to Hula-Up dolls holding a pair of Christmas' tree balls... for some odd reason.

Dean ignored those. This was going to be his last gift for his brother. He needed something special, something that told Sam how much pride Dean had in the man he'd become; how much Dean trusted him to be okay on his own when Dean was gone.

The porn selection of the tiny shop wasn't anything to brag about, but it had some. And the shaving cream was a brand that Dean was sure to give a rash even to a caveman.

They were, however, perfect. Dean was sure Sam would get the message.

* * *

**MALLEUS MALEFICARUM **

They return to the motel just for long enough to pick up their things. There's a gutted mattress on one of the beds and a large stain of red on the carpet at the foot of the other. Neither of them wants to stay there for much longer.

"You know... before," Sam stammers, picking up his bathroom stuff and stuffing it in a too small bag. "You know I only left you to go after those witches. Because it was the only way to stop the spell before it killed you. Right?"

Dean remains silent, folding a pair of jeans into one long roll so that it can fit inside his duffle without much trouble. He's not even sure if the jeans are his or Sam's.

"I know that's what you want to make yourself believe... but you and I know that ain't true."

Sam's mouth falls open for a split second, the time it takes him to readjust from 'seeking Dean's reassurance' to 'Dean stole the carpet from under my feet'.

"What? Ho—how can you think that?"

"Because I know you, Sam," Dean said, no recrimination in his voice. "Sometimes, I know you better than you know yourself."

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Sam asked, defensively.

"That you'd rather fight to the last minute than to just sit and watch me die."

"Of course I—"

"I just need you to keep something in mind, Sam," Dean cut through his protests.

"What?"

"That when the time comes, you'll stop fighting."

* * *

**DREAM A LITTLE DREAM**

They both wake up with a gasp and stare at each other. Dean has no idea how Sam was able to stop it, but he's thankful beyond reason that it stopped when it did. He can't say that to Sam, not without raising some questions about what he saw in there, questions that are amongst the last things Dean wants to talk with Sam about.

No... as far as Sam knows, Dean's dream was as vanilla as they come, possibly tantric and sweaty, with no mentions of facing himself or about Dean's fear of becoming a demon.

Sam admits only as far as saying that it was over and that Jeremy wouldn't be using the dream root anymore. He says nothing about the way he took control of the dream, or about how he managed to summon Jeremy's father to action. Sam certainly will never say a word about the fact that he could control the father's actions. Or what those actions were.

* * *

**MYSTERY SPOT**

The next stop they make, Sam walks into the motel room with every weapon that they have. He sets them on one of the beds, pulls a chair closer to the comforter and starts cleaning them all.

There is absolutely nothing out of the ordinary about that, except for the fact that Dean's usually the one in charge of that particular task and, when he does it, he never takes the whole damn thing with him.

More disturbing than that, is the way Sam completely disconnects with every thing around him when he starts cleaning those weapons. He goes to so far away that he actually jumps and points the gun in his hands _at_ Dean when Dean, tired of the silence, clears his throat.

"T'hell, man?"

"You're here," Sam whispers, slowly lowering the gun. It sounds like a surprise to him, like Dean _hadn't_ been there for the past three years.

"Where the hell would I be?" Dean asks, still dumbstruck at the fact that Sam had actually pointed a gun at his face.

"Gone."

The single word is said with such longing and desperation that Dean finds himself crossing the room and shoving the weapons aside so that he can sit on the bed, in front of his brother. "I'm here."

Sam's eyes fill with unshed tears and he looks down, because all of a sudden the gun-oil stain in the rag in his hands is way more interesting than Dean's intense gaze.

"I'm here," Dean repeats, holding Sam's shoulders. In the quiet of his mind, he curses the trickerster for putting that look in his brother's face.

Sam slowly leans forward, not stopping until his head is resting against Dean's, his tears finally failing to baptize them both. "For now."

* * *

**JUS IN BELLO**

"You're sure you don't want that looked at?" Sam offered one more time, catching Dean's pained flinch when he moved his arm the wrong way.

"Am I sure I don't want your giant paws poking around the hole—" Dean starts, biting the rest of his words out as he remembers that that was exactly what Meg did when she was possessing Sam awhile back. The memory of those dark events and Sam's whitewashed face turn the intended sarcasm and playful tone completely useless. "Yeah, I'm sure."

Sam smiled in appreciation for the cut-off words, making himself comfortable on his bed. "Just asking, you know... before you drop down like a sack of potatoes because of the raging infection caused by a wound not cleaned properly."

"You doubting fair Nancy's skills?" Dean asked with a smirk and a wiggle of his brows that clearly said that nursing skills was not what he was talking about.

"Get your mind off the gutter, Dean," Sam replied with a chuckle. "I'm surprised that girl remained a virgin after breathing the same air as you."

"Hey!" Dean protested over-dramatically. "I'm a gentle man," he offered coyly. "Ask any of the women I've been with."

"You got her phone number, didn't ya?"

Dean used his uninjured arm to pull a folded piece of paper from his jeans. "That I did."

"You're a dog," Sam concluded. "A horny dog."

"Well, I figured that for someone who was on Federal custody, shot by a FBI director, trapped in a jail under demonic siege... to come out on the other end breathing, in one piece, with the majority of the possessed people A-okay _and_ with the FBI off our tracks for good," Dean said, counting the pros and cons of the day. "I'd say it's a day worth celebrating."

"You're seeing her later, aren't you?"

"That I am," Dean confirmed with a satisfied smile. "Just waiting on her to call me up to set the place."

* * *

**LONG DISTANCE CALL**

There were very few times in his life when Sam wished he could clone himself on cue. Usually, when there was any need to be in two places at the same time, Dean was there to be his second pair of hands or eyes.

This time though, Dean was the reason why Sam needed to be in two places at the same time. In one hand, Sam knows he needs to go to Lanie and stop something terrible from happening to her or her brother; and on the other, Sam also knows that Dean's head is not in the right place right now, which leaves Sam terrified at what Dean might do while he's away.

It's really not a choice at all. If Dean was thinking straight, he would agree with Sam.

It hurts a little though, something that Sam will admit to himself alone if to nobody else; but for a whole year, he'd been trying his best to keep Dean's hope alight and doing his best to save his brother. And one single call from someone impersonating their father is what brings hope back to Dean's eyes.

And the hardest part of it all, is that Sam's the one who will have to be there when that hope dies.

* * *

**TIME IS ON MY SIDE**

Sam takes off as soon as they're done with Doc Benton's grave.

It's not a 'taking off' as he's done before, with bags in hand and a goodbye on his lips; it's a temporary ' taking off'.

This time around, Dean knows exactly where Sam is headed. So, he gives his brother a good head start before going after him. Books a room for them, gets their stuff inside, stocks up on the aspirin and water bottles.

There's a bar not far from the place they left Benton counting earthworms for eternity. Sam's sitting on a stool at the front of the bar, nursing a glass filled with scotch too yellow to be any of the good stuff.

Dean wonders if this is how Sam will deal with his disappointments from here on after. He takes one step forward before figuring out that it won't do Sam any good to be reminded of the safety net that's being taken away. Instead of picking up Sam before he can drink enough to get himself a nasty hangover, Dean turns away and leaves.

He hopes Sam can find his way home on his own.

* * *

**NO REST FOR THE WICKED**

Dean's body feels broken when they try to move him, like pieces and important strings are missing or cut and whatever is left is not enough to keep him together without falling apart.

Sam and Bobby can't grab his arms because the flesh on Dean's chest is cut too deep, too widely, and they fear it will all come loose if they put too much strain there; they can't grab his legs for the exact same reason.

From where he's standing, Bobby can see Dean's hipbone, white against all the red. It turns his stomach.

Sam has finally come around to close Dean's eyes, a gesture that Bobby couldn't appreciate more. That boy's soul had always been too close to the surface in those big green eyes of his, plain for all to see; Bobby feared that, had he looked into those eyes now, he would get a glimpse of the place Dean's soul was right now. The sight of Dean's mangled body was more than enough; Bobby didn't needed to see the torment his soul was going through on top of that.

They end up wrapping Dean in a comforter before moving him. There's a red quilted one over the couch. It looks handmade, probably a family heirloom.

Bobby doesn't consider any of that as he snatches it from is place and sets it gently around Dean. His only thought is that the thing doesn't look warm enough. It keeps Dean's pieces together though.

He doesn't try to pick Dean up either. Bobby knows Sam wants that burden for himself and he won't share it with anyone else.

Instead, Bobby walks ahead of Sam, opening doors and sending hard stares at the crowd standing outside.

No one will say anything; they're all still dealing with their own shock of finding themselves possessed by a demon and then abandoned to the consequences of their actions.

Bobby warns them to back off anyway. Sam's defeated steps and the bloody body that a red quilt can't quite hide are none of their business anyway.

The perfect mowed lawn has a trail of blood in it now. That too doesn't concern Bobby. He starts his truck and looks at the backseat one last time.

The world is a sadder place now. There should be some mark left behind.


	4. Season 4

**LAZARUS RISING**

Bobby hears the shower running and scratches his beard. Of all the ways he had thought this day would go... hugging Dean's warm, unmangled body was not even on the list.

The joy of seeing Dean out of Hell, alive and well was, however, overshadowed by the uncertainty of what had taken him out and for what purpose.

Souls didn't simply walked out of Hell; and bodies with a four-month decay rate didn't simply regain the ability to process air. It just didn't happen.

There was no spell, no curse, no being ever recorded or heard of to be able to pull something like that. It made Bobby sick to his stomach that someone he knew and love was the first to pull it off, because Bobby knew how these things worked.

There was always a price. And the price was always too high.

* * *

**ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT'S ME, DEAN WINCHESTER**

Dean falls asleep on the floor. Well, it's more of a 'falls unconscious' than a falls asleep, but the end result is still the same.

Sam and Bobby exchange a look. They both know how hard the whole 'God has a plan for you' thing is hitting Dean, but neither can do much about the matter. There's something bigger than anything they've ever faced at work there, something that they can't fully comprehend, something that they are not sure they can even hope to win. Something they also know they can't escape, not when Dean's standing that close to the center of the flames.

They did managed to survive the day, which certainly counts for something as far as Bobby's book goes. A good number of hunters weren't as lucky as them.

Beyond that, all that they can do is wait and see and be prepared for anything.

It's a cold night, and Sam picks up two blankets from the cabinet in the hall. He puts one under Dean's head, uses the other to cover him.

Yeah, Bobby can see it plain as day... they were lucky indeed.

* * *

**IN THE BEGINNING**

There's something strange about the young man that Mary brings home with her that night. For one, he physically reminds her of her brother, Arthur. Same height, same built, same eyes.

What's even more odd, is that he reminds her of a younger Samuel, back when they had started dating. The fact that he has the same name as her doesn't go unnoticed either.

For a complete stranger, these are too many coincidences for Deana's hunter instincts.

But Mary seems at ease with him, and Samuel hasn't kicked the boy out yet, so she figures she might as well feed him.

The similarities between this Dean hunter and Deanna's Samuel just pile up the longer they stay together, from the way they talk, to the way they act, to the way they even _think_ alike.

The resemblance is so uncanny that Deanna finds herself considering wild theories, thinking that maybe this Dean is some sort of time traveler, a past version of her Samuel that has come to them to see if they are doing okay.

Deanna smiles to herself. The idea is so ridiculous that she can't help but call herself nuts while she goes into the kitchen to fetch dessert. She guesses she's just nostalgic, missing the days when her brother lived close by, or the days Samuel had a full head of hair.

Time traveling... really! What she needs is to cut back on those H.G. Wells novels.

* * *

**METAMORPHOSIS**

Dean never forgets that Sam lived alone for four months. Not only alone, but alone with the consequences of Dean's stupid mistakes.

Yes, Dean knows it was selfish to make that deal, and yes, he knows he had sworn he would never do something like that, especially after all he'd gone through from knowing that his father had done the same for him. _To_ him.

But Dean had hoped, he had _believed_ that Sam would find the strength to be stronger than him. To find Sam using the powers that he had sworn he would never use again, guided by the demon whose whereabouts he'd sworn he didn't knew... it stung. It stung hard enough for Dean to want to break his brother's lying face; it stung hard enough for Dean to recognize that Sam wasn't as strong as he had wanted to believe.

It stung hard enough for Dean to realize that he had failed.

* * *

**MONSTER MOVIE**

Dean's so giddy about that job that Sam doesn't have the heart to rain on his parade. Much.

There is an end of the world going on outside of the quiet little town they're stuck in, and they do have more important things to do than hunt vampires who aren't vampires. Or werewolves. Or even cursed mummies.

However, watching Dean shamelessly hitting on Jamie is completely worth the time they're wasting there. It certainly serves to put some of Sam's concerns about his brother at rest.

Sam's not an idiot; he knows perfectly well that even though he doesn't remember it, some very bad things happened to Dean in the pit, bad enough for Dean to act differently, to be a different person since he returned. His conscious mind might not be aware of it, but Dean's subconscious is repressing some very heavy-duty traumas.

And even buried deep, they are not without consequences.

Dean doesn't sleep much these days, closing his eyes only when he's too exhausted to keep them open; he doesn't eat well either, unless he realizes that Sam is paying notice to his eating habits; he drinks too much, more than he ever did in his life -even during his darkest days after their father's death- and he usually drinks even more on the nights he's too exhausted to keep himself awake.

And he doesn't fuck.

Sam feels sort of bad for having noticed such a private thing about his own brother, particularly because details about Dean's sex life are usually something that Sam does his best to ignore, but... when you live in London, you kind of notice when it doesn't rain.

Dean hadn't shown any particular interest in sex or women since he'd come back. Sure, there had been the flirting thing with Pamela, but that had been more reaction than action on his brother's side and in the end poor woman had other concerns on her mind to follow through with her invitations.

It's different with Jamie. Dean is actually invested in going out with her, in being with her. He's even throwing his most cheesy lines at her.

Sam sees that as a good sign. A recovery sign.

A more than worthy reason for them to stay with that pointless hunt.

The fact that he later finds Dean dressed in the most ridiculous pair of shorts Sam has ever seen his brother in? That's just the icing on the cake.

* * *

**YELLOW FEVER**

When they arrive at the motel, Dean's passed out, asleep on the floor at the foot of his bed. There is a body in the living room where the coffee table used to be and a bible, tossed on the floor at room's entry.

Bobby lifts the edge of the coat that has been tossed over the corpse, finding a silver star that matches the rest of the cop's uniform. "Know him?"

Sam looks up from where he's crouching near Dean's hand. "That's the sheriff. He dead?"

Bobby puts two fingers on the man's neck, more to look busy than because he has any doubts about the sheriff's condition. The man is cold to touch and his eyes are glazed over with a thin layer that reminds Bobby of iced lakes. "He's dead. How's Dean?"

"Sleeping," Sam says, confirming the origin of the sound that they both could hear since they'd entered the room. Dean's snores.

Dean was mostly silent in his sleep, only snoring like an eager beaver building the biggest damn ever when he was exhausted. This was louder than that.

Still, exhausted was a hell of a lot better than dead.

"We need to haul ass," Bobby points out. The sheriff clearly died of natural causes, like all the other poor shmucks infected by the ghost illness.

Still, Bobby doesn't want to stick around and explain why there is a dead body in the middle of their living room. "Should we wake him up?"

"I don't think we can," Sam says with a smile, looking at his brother. He'd forgotten all about the intense relief that cursed through his body like heroin whenever Dean dodged another bullet. Like the drug, it could be addictive, if it weren't for all the hand wringing that usually proceeded it. "Get the bags?"

Bobby nods, looking around to see if they're forgetting something. "Need a hand with him?"

Sam shakes his head. He has already pulled Dean into a sitting position, ready to toss him over a broad shoulder and get up. "Nah... we're good."

* * *

**IT'S THE GREAT PUMPKIN, SAM WINCHESTER**

Sam finds Dean sitting on a park nearby. Even though he looks like he's sitting alone, Sam's knows better.

For anyone else on that park, Dean's one more of the crazy people who wonder aimlessly on the streets, talking to themselves and acting nuts without a care for the world. Sam is the only one who knows that Dean's not talking to himself; in fact, he knows exactly with whom his brother is talking to.

Even from a distance, Sam can see the frowns on faces of the moms and the dads and the nannies, all wondering if its time to get their children away from the crazy person before he does something that will scar their kids for life. If they only knew...

For a moment, Sam entertains the idea of acting nuts as well and shouting it out for everyone to hear, tell them all about how this was supposed to have been the last day of their lives.

"That would be unwise," a deep voice says from behind him.

Sam recognizes it even before he turns around to meet the trench-coat wearing angel.

"I wasn't gonna—" Sam starts defending himself, only to bite the rest of his words off. Years of believing in God and his angels and associating them with goodness can not be undone in one afternoon but Sam reminds himself that he owes these creatures no explanation for his actions. Dean's right; they're nothing but dicks with wings.

"It is not to us that you need explaining yourself, for we will not be the ones to judge your soul, Samuel."

"It's Sam," he corrects automatically. Only his father called him Samuel, and that was only when he was truly pissed at something Sam had done.

"The test ahead for the two of you," the angel went on, as if Sam hadn't opened his mouth at all. From the way Castiel kept replying to Sam's thoughts, he figured talking was pointless anyway.

"What test? What are you talking about?"

"Life is a test, Samuel, for all mortals... and the one you and your brother face is much too great for a human to face alone," the angel goes on, his eyes looking at the distance. Sam wonders if he's seeing the swings set or the future.

"You would do well to stand together."

Before Sam can reply or ask what the hell Castiel is talking about, he finds himself alone, talking to himself, like any other crazy person.

He lets out a frustrated sigh. '_Together_' would be a lot easier if Dean wasn't so pissed at him right now.

* * *

**WISHFUL THINKING**

"Nuhmm."

Sam looked up from his research. Dean's sleeping on top of the bed covers, arms wrapped around his midsection.

The bad sandwich had caused a good amount of havoc on his brother's stomach and Dean had eventually relented to lie down for a bit, see if being horizontal helped with his... intestinal issues.

"No..."

Sam could see why Dean had been so reluctant to use the bed. He had been seeing it for quite some time now. The way Dean never slept for long, how he was the last to go to bed and the first to get up. Sam could easily recognize the pattern as one he himself had used before, when nightmares of Jess plagued his nights.

Uriel had given Sam no news. Sam already knew there was something haunting Dean's nights; something stirring in Dean's memories.

"No, I'll never..."

Dean begun trashing on the bed, feet digging against the comforter, head turning from side to side, arms slammed by his side as his hands balled into fists. Like he was trapped, like he was... strapped in place.

When Dean's half-mumbled words turned into pained whimpers, Sam figured that enough was enough. Dean had had _some_ rest and Sam had reached his limit of how far he could stand to watch his brother in pain.

"Dean! Wake up!"

* * *

**HEAVEN AND HELL**

It would've been a lot easier if, after his sobbed confession, Dean had chosen to chase that beer with ten more and just slip into an alcoholic semi-coma. That way, when he woke up, they could both pretend this had never happened and try to move on.

Or at least buy Sam some time to digest what he'd just heard.

Instead, Dean had just asked Sam to drive, while he opened the passenger side door on the Impala and sank into the leather seat with the weariness of an eighty year old.

God! Dean actually _was_ close to being an eighty year old, now that Sam thought about it. Thirty years on Earth, plus forty in Hell... the concept took some time adjusting to. Probably a whole lifetime.

Oddly enough, the only thing that would come to Sam's mind at the moment was grumpy old men jokes; much in the same way one gets the urge to giggle at funerals. It was odd, inappropriate... and certainly easier than picturing his brother being tortured for thirty years; easier than imagining what it must've felt like to find himself in a position where he was reduced to torture others.

To think at how close Dean had come of becoming one of the them...

Thirty years of a hard life; thirty years of unimaginable pain in Hell; ten years of torturing himself over what he was doing to others and a whole lifetime ahead of him to remember it all. Sam gulped, a newfound sense of respect for his brother filling his chest. And then he knew exactly how to remind Dean of the good things worth living for.

"We're making a detour," Sam announced, just to fill the silence. Dean wasn't really paying attention to where they were going and much less to what Sam was saying.

They arrived at the Grand Canyon at sunrise.

* * *

**FAMILY REMAINS**

Sam opened the passenger door and eased himself out of the Impala. His back creaked in delight at the freedom of finally being able to stretch to its full length. "I think there's a nice motel a couple of miles ahead," Sam called out to his brother.

Dean walked out of the bushes where he'd gone to take a leak, hands brushing off his shirt to push it down. "It's late... I think it's best to just settle here and get some sleep."

Sam's back screamed its protest. They'd be going on non-stop for the past weeks. "And are you?"

Dean looked at him, completely lost on what Sam meant by that. "I'm what?"

"Sleeping," Sam clarified. "Or are you just going to stay up looking for the next job?"

"It's the end of the world, Sam," Dean tried to joke. Failed miserably. "There are just too many jobs that need doing."

Sam sighed, opening the back door and setting himself on the back seat with a pout. Again.

Dean could stay awake all he wanted. First thing next morning, Sam was getting his hands on some horse tranquilizers.

Dean would sleep then.

* * *

**CRISS ANGEL IS A DOUCHEBAG**

Sam wonders what his and Dean's life would be like if they'd ever got the chance to reach old age.

He imagines Dean will still hit on every piece of skirt he sees; Sam will probably wear glasses, from all the reading he did during his life. Half deaf is probably a given for the two of them, considering all the firearms they've been around their whole life.

They'll both probably be bald, given what Dean has told him about the lack of hair on Samuel Campbell's head and the photos of Andrew Winchester, John's father, that Sam has seen. He hopes that they'll still have their teeth, at least.

The Impala will probably be mostly for show then, not road-usable as it hits close to 100 years, but Sam is sure Dean will still dote on it every day. Given the chance, Sam figures Dean would want to be buried _in_ it.

Sam wonders if they'll live in the country or in the city. He has no doubt that they'll still be together, both unmarried. It's not like there are many single women in the hunting community and Sam can't really see himself or Dean sharing a life with someone else who doesn't know what they did for a living or what they went through.

They'll have a dog, Sam knows that too. A big one, black probably, and Dean will name him Sabbath, or hellhound or some other in-joke that no one else will get.

Sam would like that. It's something to look forward to. It's something that he keeps in mind as he puts his lips to Ruby's skin and drinks her blood.

* * *

**SEX AND VIOLENCE**

The siren watches from afar the two men talking with that Cara Roberts woman. _It_ has dealt with hunters before; _it _knows exactly what they are.

And _it_ knows exactly how to defeat them. Men have always been the same since the first sailor that washed upon the shores of the island where _it_ used to live. Not much has changed.

The taller one smells oddly, still human but mixed with something else that the siren can't quite name. Something at least as old as _it_ is. It's too risky to start with him, so it picks the other one, the shorter one. The broken one.

The wounds inside that man run so deep that _it_ can sense them even from that distance. A lost sailor, adrift in the world.

Perfect. Just like old times.

_It_ wonders next what shape it shall assume to better seduce its prey. The shorter one sure looks gluttonously enough towards the pretty doctor, but it's the rush of feelings that the siren senses when he looks at the taller one –brother, anchor, family, blood, confident, support, love, treason, pain- that makes the decision final.

A little brother _it_ shall become. And how easy it will be to turn family against each other.

* * *

**DEATH TAKES A HOLIDAY **

Pamela's dying words ring inside Sam's head non-stop. If in one hand he is sure that she had no idea what she was talking about, on the other Sam knows he needs to be honest with himself and recognize that Pamela could see more than your average duck.

He's aware that the road he's taking is a dangerous one; Sam's well aware of the risks. What Pamela forgot in her dying moments were the stakes at play in this game. And they were just too high for Sam to pussy foot around what he could do and the chance he had at stopping Lilith.

* * *

**ON THE HEAD OF A PIN**

'_He's not breathing'_

Those were the only words inside Sam's mind at the moment. The angels' self-righteous beliefs that Sam couldn't be trusted to get the job done and Dean's annoying inability to say no to them, had resulted into this: Castiel hanging from a wooden post like an old coat, Alastair laughing at their pathetic attempts to break him and Dean, bloody on the floor.

'_He's not breathing.'_ Sam's brain reminded him again, as he pushed Alastair's bored face against the wall and freed Castiel.

Sam barely registered Alastair's screams of pain as anything but payback for what he had done to Dean; or the confounded look on the angel's face as Sam does what he and his angels' pals failed to do.

"He's not breathing," Sam finally voices once Alastair is dead and he can go to Dean's side. "Get us to a hospital. Now!"

* * *

**IT'S A TERRIBLE LIFE**

Sam Wesson.

Sam stares at the name plate on his chest like it's the first time he's seeing it, like he just realized in that moment that that is his name.

It doesn't fit, he figures. Somehow, the name feels too... short. He can't say this to anyone else without being the butt-end of endless size-related jokes –again- but he can't help the feeling. It just is what it is, but at the same time, Sam is sure that there should be more to it.

Every one working in his section is there temporarily. Some of them have been in that same job, 'temporarily', for over twenty years. None of them, however, feels like his whole existence there is temporary. None, except Sam.

* * *

**THE MONSTER AT THE END OF THIS BOOK**

They're not as Chuck had pictured them. In his visions, it was mostly feelings, emotions and thoughts that he would get. Rarely he had visions of Sam or Dean while they stood at the mirror, looking at their own reflection. So, he had made an educated guess.

He got some things right, like how tall Sam is, or how green Dean's eyes look when he's angry. He completely failed on the hairstyles.

With some details, he made a mistake of perspective. Sam _is_ the tallest, but Dean's still tall enough to loom over Chuck like a frigging Eiffel Tower; and Dean _is_ the more terrifying of the brothers, but Sam's pretty scary on his own.

These two facts, Chuck gets straightened out in his head when the Winchester brothers burst into his home like a pair of twin hurricanes.

* * *

**JUMP THE SHARK**

Dean really wants to blame Adam for the father that John was, but he can't. Even though John was there to take Adam to baseball games on his birthday, while Dean's birthdays were spend hunting whatever thing they were after at the time, Dean can't really blame Adam for that. Those were John's choices and he was the one who decided that one set of sons he would raise as soldiers... the other as a son.

It just hurts to realize that Sam and Dean were the ones stuck in the wrong set.

* * *

**THE RAPTURE**

It's hard to look at Castiel, the angel who can barely pass as human when they need him to, as a 'Jimmy'.

It's harder to look at Sam's face, covered in demon blood from the neck he's just sucked on, and remember the little boy who used to make a mess of himself when eating chocolate ice cream.

Somehow, Castiel and Jimmy mix as seamlessly as chocolate and blood.

* * *

**WHEN THE LEVEE BREAKS**

When Bobby picks up the phone, he already knows its bad news. What else could it be when Sam takes off the way he did and Dean goes after him with that look in his eyes? "Hello?"

The voice on the other side is barely audible, like a frog trying to bark from the bottom of a deep and dark well. "Bobby? I—"

It's not the words. Bobby can hardly hear those, but the tone is one he will always recognize, one that he will always understand. The fact that Dean's voice is barely recognizable as human and there's a disturbing wheezing every time Dean breaths, concerns Bobby just as much as the despair he can hear behind the words that aren't spoken. "Where are you, boy?"

"He'—he's gone. Bobby, I told him—" Dean croaks back, more intend on saying what's obviously weighing on his mind rather than the fact that he probably needs help.

"Dean, son, focus... I need you to tell me where you are so that I can help you," Bobby says very slowly, vowing to himself that after this, he's getting himself one of those call-tracking devices that the feds are so fond.

"I lost him, Bobby."

Those are the last words Bobby hears before the line goes dead. And his heart dies a little with it.

* * *

**LUCIFER RISING**

Dean has never envied Sam's powers. He was more than aware of the pain and suffering that the visions, and the telekinesis, or even the demon-exorcism thingy brought to his brother. He was more than aware of the years if angst Sam had gone through as he discovered that he was different.

Dean envied Sam's powers now, as he raced through that abandoned convent's corridor, knowing that he would never get to those doors in time; knowing that no human muscles would be able to open those wooden doors once they close; knowing that he was so close, and yet he could do nothing to save Sam.

For just one moment, Dean wished that his mind could really open those doors, wished that he could kill Ruby with just one look.

One moment. That was all Dean needed.


	5. Season 5

**SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL**

It was the oddest thing, to see that much blood leaking out of his body, to see that much equipment surrounding his bed, to see the bleak and serious faces of everyone around him... and to feel absolutely nothing.

It made Bobby wonder if everyone wasn't simply overreacting.

It was only when the wheelchair rolled into his room, the one chair where he would spend the rest of his life, that the bitter reality finally came crushing down.

Dean was the one behind the wheelchair, pushing it as if it was his cross, his shame to bear. The fake smile that he had managed to maintain up until that point had vanished from his pale face.

Watching Dean walk into his room, alive, breathing and acting like an idiot who blamed himself for what had happened, reminded Bobby that there was an alternative to that wheelchair. Reminded Bobby of why exactly he was now an insensitive bastard from his prick down.

Bobby would gladly give up his life for either of those boys, that is something he had known for a very long time; he is happy to realize that the same is true for his freedom.

* * *

**GOOD GOD, Y'ALL**

There is an old Chinese saying from a famous general that says _'Keep your friends close and your enemies closer'_. Dean had never thought that those were words he would ever apply to his own brother.

They weren't enemies in the sense of one setting out to hurt the other, at least not purposively; but the distrust, the feeling of unprotectiveness and _fear_ whenever Sam was out of his sight... Dean couldn't help it.

Every time he tried to remind himself of Sam's teary apologies in that abandoned convent, that Sam did the right thing in the end, Dean's mind worked against him. Image upon image of Sam protecting Ruby, of Sam's face smeared with demon blood, of Sam's fist colliding with Dean's face, of Sam's fingers wrapped around his neck as the world dimmed around them both.

And for every time his conscience loses one more battle with his memories, Dean feels the bitterness towards his brother building up.

It's a good thing that Sam leaves when he does, or one day Dean might've looked at his brother and come to the conclusion that he hated him.

* * *

**FREE TO BE YOU AND ME**

When people say things like 'tall, dark and handsome', Lindsey's pretty sure it's men like Keith that they have in mind.

Mysterious too, as if those broad shoulders and soulful eyes needed any extra credit points.

Mysterious, however, was conductive to curious. As in the curiosity that Keith arose in those around him. And Lindsey had decided to find out more.

You can learn a lot just from observing people going about their mundane, everyday tasks. And in a place where most of the clientele arrived late at night, she had plenty of time on her hands to play detective.

For one, mundane activities were not mundane for that guy. Washing dishes, cleaning a counter, wiping a glass clean... simple things that most people would do with half of their brain shut off, Keith did with an intent and purpose as if they were the most important tasks on earth. Like he was trying too hard to do them right.

Lindsey's first guess was that the guy was either an alien or the son of someone extremely rich, like a drug dealer or something. But his hands were too callous to be the hands of a rich boy with a cushy life and she could see no antlers anywhere, so those theories went out the window.

He had lightening fast reflexes and was good at cutting things, like... scary good. Which, granted, lots of people were, so it wasn't that much of a big deal.

But the look on Keith's eyes when he had a knife on his hands was... peculiar. Such a far away gaze overcome him in those moments that she couldn't help but wonder exactly what was he seeing instead of those lemons.

Lindsey wonders if he was some sort of secret agent, retired now and hiding from his enemies. That would be cool. She can already imagine herself as the lover, taken hostage as the bad guys try to extract their revenge on the hero.

He reacts oddly to words. Like the first time some drunk called him a bitch, Keith actually smiled.

And then there is the condiments obsession. Lindsey knows for a fact that he always carries a shaker inside his pocket. She's yet to find out if it's the saltshaker or the peppershaker, but either way, it's a kinky kink.

Whoever he is, Lindsey's certain that he isn't simply a Keith, 'traveling on backpack across the country'. But she fully intents to find out who he really is.

* * *

**THE END**

He's wearing deodorant. For some reason, that is the first difference that Dean spots between himself and that... something that he caught ogling over the Impala, of all things.

Dean couldn't even remember the last time he had access to a commodity like deodorant, or aftershave. A bar of soap was a hard finding in some days.

This thing that looked so much like him smelled clean, innocent.

Whoever, or whatever it is, Dean envies him already.

* * *

**I BELIEVE THE CHILDREN ARE OUR FUTURE**

"What's this?"

"Its called soup," Dean said, trying his best to mimic an eleven year old. "You eat it."

"You cooked for me?" Sam asked, sounding half surprised, half ready to reach for the holy water. He couldn't even remember the last time Dean had cooked any of his meals.

"Well, if by 'cook' you mean boiling up some water and opening a can of soup," Dean replied, counting by his fingers the 'ingredients' in his elaborate 'recipe', "then yes, buttercup, I cooked for you."

"Wow." The sarcasm on Sam's voice went with his overly blinking eyelashes.

"Be nice and I might add a high-cuisine ham sandwich to that."

Sam's face fell. "Ham... still?"

"No fridge dude."

* * *

**THE CURIOUS CASE OF DEAN WINCHESTER**

Sam wondered on occasion, when he was feeling more pensive and hopeful, about how Dean would be like in his old age.

Somehow that grumpy, out-of-shape, whining man wasn't exactly what Sam had pictured.

He guessed it didn't actually counted as growing old when it happened in a matter of minutes; after all, his body was all wrinkled and gray but Dean's mind was still that of a thirty year old.

But then again, this was Dean, a man who had spent forty years in Hell and remembered every minute of it, which made this probably the first time, since returning to life, that Dean's body caught up with his mind.

Sam smiled. They were too odd for that sort of math.

And maybe grumpy, out-of-shape, whinny seventy-year-old Dean wasn't so bad... just as long as Sam didn't get to see him in until forty years from then.

* * *

**CHANGING CHANNELS**

The world fritzed around them once again and the next thing he knew, Dean was lying on a wooden bed, complete with the softest sheets he'd ever laid in.

The room was sunny and smelled of fresh lavender and outside, through the open window, he could see a green prairie as far as the eye could see.

Sam was in the bed next to his, taking in his surroundings much in the same way as his brother.

"Humm, Dean... are you wearing long johns too," Sam asked shyly. "Or is it just me?"

Dean peeled the edge of his bed covers aside to look at his clothes, the same piece as Sam greeted him, covering his body from neck to ankle. "Yup. Flannel."

"It gets mighty cold in here at night. And you boys were outside in that storm last night for too darn long," a woman's voice, gentle and maternal, joined the conversation. "You boys feeling better now?"

Dean took in the woman's clothes, with the floral button up shirt, and the long, brown skirt with a well-worn apron over it. Her dark hair was perfectly arranged in a bun that sat on the top of her head and in her hands, an honest to God water jar.

"I... er... we're fine, ma'm," Dean finally replied politely, his words easily slipping into the same slang and accent the woman had used.

Truth was, he was feeling more than fine. He was feeling rested, safe. At peace.

"Ma'!" a young girl's voice cut into their conversation, coming from deeper inside the house. She was dressed in the same manner as the woman, the waist apron replaced by a full-length version. "Ma', the chickens need water and I can't get the pump to work."

"See if Pa' can help you with that, honey... or one of your brothers," the woman replied with a tender pat on the girl's equally dark hair. "I'm busy with our guests, Laura."

"Dean, where the hell are we?" Sam whispered, taking advantage of the woman's distraction with her daughter.

Dean smiled. He remembered this. He used to watch it in re-runs on the TV, allowing himself to get lost in that perfect family, where everyone was loved.

"I have no idea, Sam," he replied to his brother. "Let's just ride it out and see where it get us."

When they are finally allowed to get up, after some fussing around and at least three temperature readings, Sam and Dean dressed in burrowed clothes that fitted them perfectly -like TV clothing always does- and joined the rest of the family in the dinning room for the evening meal. It's a very large family, Dean remembered that as well.

And as he expected, Michael Landon sits at the head of the table, saying grace.

* * *

**THE REAL GHOSTBUSTERS**

Dean wandered closer to one of the merchandizing stands. It was odd enough to walk around and see people with yellow and black eyes everywhere he turned; or vampire teeth sticking out of people's mouths; or even an honest to God Wendigo outfit.

The items for sell on the stand stirred a pang of jealousy and selfishness in Dean's heart. His amulet, the one that used to be one of a kind, something special and personal between him and his brother, was everywhere. They had pendant amulets; they had bracelet amulets, ring amulets, even frigging trading cards with the thing

Ignoring the mass production of his feelings, Dean's eyes landed on the stack of books next. Route 666 was right on top, in all of its racist, killer truck glory.

Dean had read that one; he remembered word by word how Chuck had described in vivid detail as Dean made love to Cassie.

Dean looked at the crowd in that convention and couldn't help but blush as he realized that he was literally in a room where everyone had read about him having sex.

A stiff drink wouldn't cut it; he needed something stronger, something more memorable. He needed to kill Chuck.

* * *

**ABANDONE ALL HOPE**

Jo leaves the bed she is sharing with her mother and quietly moves through the house. Bobby is asleep in the study and she knows that Sam and Dean have taken up the library downstairs.

The house is quiet, so she figures the brothers have finally stopped analyzing every single detail from their day tomorrow and gone to sleep.

Tomorrow being the day that they're going to kill the devil.

It's not everyone that can claim to have such big plans for the following day. It could also be the last day that they'd ever have.

She had meant what she said, about wanting to keep her self-respect and not jump into Dean's bed at the first sign he gave her of being interested. For years she had hoped that he'd say those words, for years she had wondered what it was like to make love to Dean Winchester, but she'd outgrown her childish fantasies that he would ever love her.

She is, however, a grown woman -despite what her mother believes- and she has long stopped leaving for tomorrow what –and who- you could _do_ today.

Dean's asleep on the floor, at the end of the couch occupied by Sam, their combined snores filling the entire room.

Dean tenses when he feels a warm body slipping close to his under the blanket, just for a moment until he recognizes whom it is. Jo smiles seductively.

"I thought you had a date with self-respect tonight," he whispers to her mouth.

"I do," Jo whispers back, licking a stripe of bare flesh under Dean's ear. "But you're invited too.

* * *

**SAM, INTERRUPTED**

"Remember, there are no right or wrong answers to this," the head doc, or rather shrink in charge of the facility, reminded Dean as they both sat on opposite sides of a table with a pile of printed cards standing between them. "Just... say the first word that comes to your mind when you see these."

Dean was half expecting those weird ink blobs that never really looked like anything, and his inner Jack Nicholson was already planning on making as much fun of the doc as he possibly could, but there were no smudges in the papers in front of him.

Instead, he had drawings.

The first one was a glass filled with a yellow liquid. '_Sleep_' Dean thought.

"Relaxation," he said.

Next was a pile of salt. Dean snorted. _'Work'_ he thought.

"Tequilas."

A woman holding a deliciously looking pie. '_Mom_'.

"Gordy's" Dean said. Seeing the confused look on the doc's face, he explained, "Little place just outside Pikeville. Has the best chocolate pie ever known to mankind."

A man, pulling out a mask from his face. _'Work'_.

"Halloween."

A yellow square. _'Yellow eyed demon. Death'_

"Bright sunny day."

A praying angel. _'Pricks._'

"Illusions."

A couple, kissing. _'Crossroad deals'_

"Hookers."

A black car. _'Home_'.

"Transportation."

A bloody knife. _'Alastair'._

"Dinner."

The last one was of two boys; the older one had a hand poised on the younger one's shoulder._ 'Pain'_.

"Family."

* * *

**SWAP MEAT**

"Dean." The shout comes from behind the closed bathroom door, where Sam has been taking the longest shower of his life for the past hour. "Dean!"

Dean raced to the bathroom, not even thinking twice before bursting through the door and releasing the fog inside.

He was fully prepared to enter that bathroom and be confronted with a two-headed Sam, or maybe a massive bleed; he even expected to find Sam stuck in the toilet. That was how desperate he had sounded.

Dean wasn't, however, prepared to see his brother, naked, butt wiggling in front of the mirror, turning around on himself like a tail-chasing dog.

"Dean! Is that a _phone number_ on my ass?"

* * *

**THE SONG REMAINS THE SAME**

Sam could not peel his eyes away from his mother, trying to absorb every line of her face, every expression in her eyes, every quirk in her actions.

He imagines it's the same as someone meeting a movie star, only instead of risking disappointment; Mary is even more perfect than Sam had imagined her.

John fascinates him as well, even though Sam can't think of that kid as his father. Not yet.

He does recognize that Dean was right though, when he said that Sam and John were more alike that Sam thought. Sam can see it now.

John is just like him. Well, not this John, who is hopeful and innocent still in so many ways; but the one he'd going to become in a few years.

Sam wished his parents could stay like they were in those days. Forever.

* * *

**MY BLOODY VALENTINE**

"Here," Sam offered when Dean finally returned to the car where he and Cas where waiting for him.

Dean looked at the blue icepack that Sam handed to him, completely lost on what he was supposed to do with it.

"For your hand," Sam clued him in.

Dean smiled a tense 'thank you' before crushing the bag's contents and putting it on his red and swollen knuckles.

"I know it sucks," Sam went on, even though Dean was trying his best to ignore him and the angel on the backseat. "And I know it feels like we were set up since even before our parents were born—"

Dean turned a warning glance towards his brother, his stormy eyes warning about his unwillingness to talk about the matter.

"But dude..." Sam added with a smile. "Punching a butt naked cupid? That's just _wrong._"

* * *

**DARK SIDE OF THE MOON**

Dean walks with a newfound determination to the dilapidated cabin standing by the side of the road.

"Dean..." Sam calls out, unwilling to follow and revisit what happened inside that cabin, even though this is his 'happy' memory. "Let's just go. The road is _right_ here."

"No. We're here," Dean insists, boots already on the first step. "I wanna see it."

"You already know how this ends," Sam reminds him, resigned.

"Yeah, I do," Dean agrees. "But you don't."

The place is smaller than what Sam remembers. Gloomier. Darker. John is sitting on the couch, head in his hands, shoulders shaking.

"Is he—" Sam whispers, forgetting he's the ghost of past Christmas in this tale. "Is he crying? I thought..."

"What? That he'd be happy to see you go?"

"No," Sam backtracks. "I thought that he'd be too angry to even notice I was gone."

A younger version of Dean walks in, bottle of gin in his hand. He looks straight at Sam, pauses for a moment before shaking his head and walking to his father.

"Did you knew?" John whispers, voice little more than a growl. Sam knows he's been drinking as well. His voice only sounded like that when he was drunk. "Did you knew that he was planning on leaving?"

"Yes," pastDean answers.

"And you did nothing to stop this from happening?"

The question comes simultaneously from John and Sam, both of them equally surprised by pastDean's admission.

Sam turns to look at his Dean, the same way that John looks at his, looking for a reason.

"If I'd told you, you would've found a way to stop him," pastDean finally says.

"So, what? You wanted your brother gone, is that it?" John throws at him, contentious, eager for a fight.

"I didn't want him to hate you."

* * *

**99 PROBLEMS**

"What's going on with your brother?" Pastor Gideon asked when Sam finally returned to the room. "Is he okay?"

He can't help but to feel disconnected from the rest of the world, free falling down a rabbit hole that Gideon is pretty sure doesn't end up in Wonderland.

Right now, his only point of contact with reality is these three men that he has just met, the only ones in town that don't see him as a lunatic.

And even these men, solid and real as they feel, sound made up to him. The giant, Sam, looked down at him, white-faced and panicking over the fact that his brother has, apparently drove off in his car; the angel, who looked and sounded more like a recovering alcoholic, was passed out on the bed; and Dean, the one who left, had just used a holy stick to kill something that looked like Gideon's daughter and that could only be killed by a true servant of God... something they'd all said they were not.

"He's off to do something very stupid." Was the only answer that he got from Sam, before the tall man started to pack all of their belongings.

Either their faith was very thin or they did not knew themselves all that well. Gideon suspected that both reasons were true. He wished that they could see themselves as others saw them.

Gideon has study many versions of the Bible. He has preached and used many stories from there to teach and guide the people in his town.

He talked about Job and Moses and Abraham and John, the Baptist and he had never once wondered how it would feel like to know those men and women face to face, to see their weaknesses alongside with their strengths.

Gideon knows he is in the presence of future books of the same magnitude as the ones he has study his whole life and he can't help but wonder if his daughter will someday come across as a martyr or as a murderer.

* * *

**POINT OF NO RETURN**

Dean is not happy to open his eyes and find himself back at Bobby's place.

"You're an idiot," the older man says as a way of greeting. "A selfish one, at that."

"Why, Bobby, you have nothing but sweet words for me," Dean replies with sarcasm oozing out of his lips. "Where's the love?"

"Right here, in the tip of my boot, you reckless loon. What did you think you were doing?"

The sneer in Dean's face is replaced by pure self-loading and desperation. He takes a moment to get the mask back in place, but its' already too late.

"Ah, son... it might feel like it, but the fate of the world isn't on your shoulders, Dean," Bobby says, hard face melting into the parental love that they both share. "We'll find a way to save the world, even if it's the last thing that we do, but we'll find one that keeps you in it when all is said and done."

"Will we, Bobby?" Dean counters, getting to his feet and pacing the room.

It's the only thing that Bobby envies him.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that you'll try to the last second, and you will fail and we will all die," Dean says, sounding so certain that Bobby feels a chill up his spine. "And you will die knowing that you gave your best, while I'll die with a whole world's worth of lives bearing down on my conscience. So tell me, Bobby, what's worse? To be an idiot... or to be the man who let the biggest genocide of the all times, happen?"

* * *

**HAMMER OF THE GODS**

He likes Sam and Dean. As far as humans go, those two are pretty exceptional.

Granted, it was tons of fun to mess with them when they first met or when their paths crossed in the Broward County, but he kind of respects them.

Dean is right. Painful as it is for Gabriel to admit that to himself, the little human with the life span of a mosquito, was right.

He joked as hard as he did because reality was just too sad and painful. He avoided his family because dealing with them was too painful.

But knowing how his brothers were killing one another, knowing what Lucifer planned to do to that little planet that Gabriel had learned to love? That hurt more.

Dean was right. It was time to stop being a pussy and kick his big brothers out of his playground.

* * *

**THE DEVIL YOU KNOW**

Sam hates the inner voices inside his head. The ones who voice his doubts, the ones that point out the things he doesn't want to notice. Like the fact that it hurts like hell to see his brother leaving him behind while he goes off to do _their_ job with a demon.

Irony is not only a bitch, it's a vindictive one.

* * *

**TWO MINUTES TO MIDNIGHT**

What a wonderful demon Dean would've made.

Crowley can't help the thought as he sits and watches Dean walk towards Death. Head held high, steps firm and unwavering, even as he trembles inside like a thin leaf.

He was fierce down below, Crowley remembers that too. He used to visit, when Alastair was in the mood to brag, and they'd both sit and watch Dean work. Head held high, hands firm and unwavering even as his soul shimmered with disgust at what he was doing.

Crowley imagines he might still have his chance to see Dean with black eyes. Maybe red. He'd certainly hire him.

And the man _is_, after all, walking towards Death.

* * *

**SWAN SONG**

"_Can I climb?"_

When Sam was four, he saw this metal contraption in the park near Dean's school. The thing was clearly meant for kids at least three times Sam's age, but he wouldn't shut up about the thing. Dean let him. Sam broke two teeth.

"_Can I throw?"_

When Sam was six, he saw Dean skipping stones on the lake, flat rocks leaving trails of circular worms on the water's surface. He wanted to do that too, so Dean let him. He had to fish Sam out of the water and explain to their father why they were both drenched when they got home.

"_Can I shoot?"_

When Sam was nine, he learned what John actually did for a living. He was scared to death that some monster might come and attack them while dad was away. He begged Dean to take him shooting. Dean took him. First gun Sam fired, the recoil was so intense that it took five stitches to stop his bleeding head.

"_Can I have a life of my own?"_

It was more sarcasm than a request. When Sam was eighteen, he left anyway. Dean couldn't have stop him from going, but he didn't even tried.

"_Can I jump?"_

He didn't ask that question, not directly anyway, but it was there, implicit in the way he laid the plan to defeat Lucifer. And Dean let him.


	6. Season 6

**EXILE ON MAIN ST.**

Lisa finds herself cataloging the differences between the boy she had spent a weekend with, all those years ago, and the man sleeping in her bed now.

Physically he has matured. Everyone grows old, that's a fact, and everyone changes with age. That is not what she means.

Dean's matured in the same way that a skittish colt matures into a beautiful stallion.

The long limbs that seemed out of place and looked like they were missing something when Dean was nineteen, have now filled with muscle and purpose; the skinny face where his mouth took too much space, has filled and become solid, dependable. Trustworthy.

There are some things that she misses.

The bad boy attitude, that she can't decide if it was a casualty of age or of the life he led; the open laughter, that she remembers so well but has yet to openly experience; the carefree way in which Dean used to make love, now replaced by a attentive lover that notices every detail, but is afraid of baring himself to her.

There are some things that are new.

The hand-shape burn mark on his shoulder, that Dean takes half a year to tell her that is from the angel who pulled him out of Hell; the way he would start to shiver uncontrollably whenever Lisa tried to cook a lobster, something that she gave up when he finally confessed that it sounded like the souls he had tortured in Hell; the way he refuses to drive that car of his, conserving it like a shrine to a life that she knows he can't go back to, but that he can't really let go.

* * *

**TWO AND A HALF MEN**

It looks so easy when Dean does it, easy enough that Sam almost considers picking up the baby as well and try to feed it—him.

He doesn't ponder too hard on it. It's just a fleeting thought, like so many that Sam has these days. Thought and discarded because there was no point to them. There is certainly is no point in who feeds the baby, just that it gets fed.

But Sam is curious and picks it up when Dean is in the bathroom. Earlier, he had barely looked at it, merely collecting the baby as evidence of what had happened in that house.

He had hardly noticed how warm the baby is. Or how good it smells.

Sam leans forward and takes a whiff, trying to catalogue exactly what it is that he is smelling. It's not soap, or food, and it's not his diaper. It's a particular smell that Sam had forgotten even to exist.

The baby smells like life.

"You sniffing a baby?" Dean asks, light tone in his voice, towel around his neck.

"Kid needs a change," Sam says. It's the first thing that comes to his mind, and it's a reason to hand back the baby to his brother.

* * *

**THE THIRD MAN**

Dean couldn't move. It was like the world had been turned upside down and he was the only one who had noticed the difference.

Angels might be pricks in general, but Castiel had always been the one that Dean could count on to do the right thing. It couldn't count as '_the right thing'_ to torture a kid like that, no matter what was at stake.

And Sam... Sam had been Dean's moral compass for years. When the hunting world started to be too much and Dean would lose sight of what was right and what was wrong, Sam was there, to gently tell him that vampires weren't evil just because they were vampires; to remind him that a monster isn't a monster until it decides to act as a monster; to guide a little kid who could turn the whole world into ashes, into the right path.

Asking if there would be any permanent damage didn't quite cover it. Not even by far.

But Dean was just one. And his moral compass was broken.

* * *

**WEEKEND AT BOBBY'S**

"I could go alone," Sam suggests. After they've checked in their luggage, and pass through at least five security checks points.

"I'm fine," Dean says, for what feels like the hundredth time since Bobby put in his request.

"Did you take the pill?"

Dean rolls his eyes, wondering how he had become the chick in that relationship. After all the sass that he'd had to face from his brother about the frigging sedative p—

"The one for the traveling sickness," Sam cuts in through his thoughts.

Dean pales further more. He had completely forgotten about that one. How could he forget ab—

"Man... these are going to be some _long_ nine hours," Sam concludes, seeing his brother's face.

* * *

**LIVE FREE OR TWI-HARD**

"Drink," the man, the thing, says again. "You'll feel better."

Dean shakes his head. He will never do that. The thirst inside feels like nothing he's felt before, like he's spent the whole day licking sand after pouring raw alcohol down his throat. It feels like his insides are turning into dust and he wonders how it is possible that the drool that runs down his mouth can possibly be liquid at all.

It takes him a minute to realize that it's not drool trickling down his chin. It's blood.


End file.
